The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1887-11-12
Northwestern Wheat and Flour.

Northwestern Wheat and Flour.
John NJ StaM in Gettysburg, Ra., Compiler
"Great oaks from little acorns grow"
From Frenchman' S looking on some float
ing dust with unusually curious eyes, there
has grown the great -four making industry
of Minneapolis, Minneapolis itself, and the
development of the vast wheat fields OF
Minnesota, Dakota and Manitoba.
Minneapolis is the greatest flour milling
city in the world In 1885 Minneapolis
mills made 4,S50,962 barrels of flour; in
1886, 1851 900 barrels. These figures
cannot convey to our minds an adequate
idea of this product Nor will it really
aid us to compute that it will take so many
trains of an impossible number of cars to
carry the product to New York. Min
neapolis -four goes to all parts of the civil
lied world. OF the product OF 1856,
2,543,000 barrels were exported to foreign
countries. No make of -four stands higher
for quality than this Minneapolis -four made
from the hard-berry spring wheat of the
great Northwest.
Minneapolis is also the greatest wheat
market of the world. During 1886 the
wheat receipts of Minneapolis were 30. O66,-
100 bushels; at Duluth, 1862, 1893; at Chi
cago. Is. 9S2, 524. take the figures from
the reports of the Boards of Trade of these
cities.
Having passed through the wheat fields
of the Rcd River Valley, Northera Dakota
and Manitoba-wheat fields that cannot be
imagined, but must be seem desired to
know where this wheat was manufactured
and to see how it was done Hence went
to the great Touring mills OF Minneapolis.
The reader who has followed me through
the valley, across Dakota and over Man
itoba. will doubtless be interested in these
mills-something to make even an Amer
lean wonder, and of which every Amer
lean should be proud.
In 1860 the entire product Of the Min
neapolis mills was only 10000 barrels. in
1850, the population of the town was only
1906. The milling industry of the city,
the city itself. and the great Northwest, let
me repeat, have sprung with such marvel
GUS growth from Frenchman investiga-
tons of dust particles.
Let us see why this is. The spring
wheat that can be raised in this Northwest
has small, hard, dark-berry, with tightly
clineing husk. The old process Of milling
did not remove thoroughly the dark bran
from the -four made from the wheat, hence
the -four was dark colored; and it got less
percentage of flour from this hard berry
than from the soft-berried winter wheat that
was produced further south. The foul
made at Minneapolis and elsewhere from
this hard. dark spring wheat, was OF The
lowest grade. 1t sold for much less thai
soft spring wheat or winter wheat Hour
Hard northern spring wheat sold in thu
milling market for twenty-five cents less pc
bushel than winter varieties.
Along toward the close of the tifties, j osepl
Perrigault, French sarGnt, noticed thai
the particles floating in the atmosphere de
scribed light curves of nearly Horizontal
figure; and that when they came withiI
one or two centimeters of table they wer'
attracted to it. He says: "They slowl,
sank, but they sank; and when they ar
rived at one or two millimeters only, | saw
them throw themselves on the surface o
the table, obeying evidently law OF at
traction, the causes of which have neve
been explained" Perrigault had fount
why all the shelves Of the book case, nj
matter what their height, are charged witt
an equal amount of dust; but he found some
thing of vastly more Importance; how Il
get the dust from the middlings purified
-specks of bran and other dust particle
which, retained, make the -four dark col
ored and otherwise of inferior quality. IL
1860, Perrigault invented his ''dust col
lector." Eleven years later, ex Gov. G. &
washburn brought the first one of thest
machines to this country and placed it ii
his mill at Minneapolis Two millers
La Croix and Smith, soon i'm
proved on Perriganlts invention, and 10
the little, dark hard, despised berry pro
duced -four surpassed by none. Doubles
at that time none realized what great stel
had been made in the evolution Of the hu
man race. But now Minnesota spring
wheat commanded good price. Before
there was no profit in raising this wheat
and the fertile prairies of Minnesota hal
settled slowly, Dakota and Manitoba wer
yet ruled by nature, aud emigration's It'd
flowed steadily iuto Kansas. The i'm
proved middlings-purifer changed all thii
Number one hard spring wheat becam
the best of all -four making wheats.
commanded highly profitable price ant
the earth produced it abundantly. Settler
s--A-bod 10 tha Nnrthwast, railroads war